The Mark
by Gilded Blue
Summary: When Pan goes missing after moving to the city and making friends with depraved socialite Bra Briefs, her father must go looking for her and retrace his daughter's steps with the coy, manipulative princess as his only guide.


**The Mark**

"Look, the game we play is called The Mark." She said, running her hands over the soft fabric on the couch. He glared at the rings, all encrusted with jewels of every color. Extravagance was this young girl, and as she looked over at him with that little cocky smile on her painted lips, he thought impatiently that she was the worst sort of life out there. Still, she acted like she didn't notice or care about his obvious disdain as she continued, lazily, "Or I guess to be clearer, that's what we call the guy."

She was sitting there, one leg lazily draped over the next, well dressed and made up like a doll, as if her meeting with him was a dinner party with her little clique. The circumstances were panicked, however, and she was lounging on his wife's couch. He could only examine the specimen as if she was something foreign and bizarre, different enough from himself to resent and yet unmistakably bright like he was. Through the ironic strands of pearls entangled with other more urban baubles and jewels and her long, painted nails he could tell that dealing with this girl was not going to be easy or pleasant.

"None of this is telling me what Pan has been doing, or where she is." He tried to be patient, as he regularly did, but still he felt like this girl was holding a very elaborately created key that would unlock the door to finding his daughter. He found that with every languid gesture of her hand and breathy phrase she used, he was closer and closer to shaking her. He closed his eyes as he was pacing, back and forth and back again, trying to control his hands and his breathing.

"Calm down, _Daddy _Son," Bra snapped, "I'm trying to tell you and I have to start somewhere, so we're starting at the beginning if that's quite all-right with you." Her nose slightly upturned, she shook her head. With an impatient glance from him, she began again, more quickly and surprisingly direct, "When Pan came to West City, she had no friends."

"And then she met _you. _" Gohan finished, looking over at the girl. She was watching him through her bangs, smiling slightly like he'd just given her a compliment or like a cat just given milk instead of giving reaction to the reality: he's been treating her like a curse. To him, she was a curse and like a plague she cast herself upon his life and family starting with his daughter, much too young and naïve for the cold city.

"Yes. Little did she know we were already more connected than we could have ever imagined. We made fast friends, your little Panny's pretty smart and beautiful and I thought she would be a wonderful addition to our little group." Bra leaned back a little bit, getting more comfortable as she stretched out over the couch. "I did her a few _favors _and pulled some strings so she could be one of us." His eyes trailed down to her heels, at least four or five inches in height encasing little painted toes, leading the eye back up to a skirt that sat tantalizingly just over her knee. Bra caught him examining her and smiled at him, "I'm kind of a_ big deal_, fashionista and heiress and party queen and all that. So I decided to make her the new It girl."

Gohan stared hard at her, "Bra, I need you to tell me exactly what that means."

"Well, that's the thing. In order to be a part of our illustrious and selective elite group, you have to play our game."

"Miss Briefs," Gohan was chewing on his lips, "I need to know what you and your awful little friends made my daughter do." He tried counting backwards. Maybe if she would just stop _smiling, _maybe if she would just stop acting like her presence and existence were these great _gifts _to humanity, he could find within himself the capacity to stay completely calm.

"I'm trying to tell you." Bra hissed, "And since I'm the only one that can help you I suggest you learn to treat me a little more nicely. As I was saying, we acquainted Pan with our game. Basically, a mark is selected and you have a certain amount of time to seduce him."

"What does that do? What do you get out of doing that?" He could only consider what a wretched thing she was, and how he hated the idea that _his good girl _was ever involved with this person. Gohan stared at her, "So you're meaning to tell me that there's a group of rich girls running around seducing men for the fun of it?"

"Like you said, we're rich. We don't _need _anything. So we spend our lives worshipping beauty and having fun." Bra waved her hand to the side lightly, little bangles jingling from her wrist. "Sometimes a few people get hurt in the process."

Gohan glowered at the young woman with distaste, snarling, "My daughter would _never-"_

"Your daughter _did _and Pan's mark was a dark, secretive man named Juunana. Weird name, don't you think? No last name, just Juunana. He lived in the woods not far away from where Pan's granddad lived, the poor one of course."

Gohan felt his brow twitch.

"Anyway, Juunana's recently moved to the city and immediately he made an impression on our friends. There's something sort of… wicked about him. We thought he would be a perfect first mark for Pan, because he seemed to be sort of an easy lay."

Bra flinched when she heard something heavy like stone fall upon his thick wooden desk. When she looked up, she seemed unsurprised that the sound came from Gohan slamming his hands down, eyes glittering like raging onyx orbs in a dim-lit room.

"Do you have _any idea _what you've done?" His voice was hoarse, raspy even and for a second Bra Briefs thinks of her father. She's heard those words before, in that tone, and she kind of gives Gohan a soft smile in response as her eyes get cloudy and her mind casts itself back to what seemed like another time.

There she was, wretched little demon in a soft ivory dress and heels. She almost seemed like she was from another world, a different sort of reality where people interact and communicate in different ways. He could barely stand to look at her as she said, "Look, I came to get you as soon as I knew what was going on. It's not like any of the other girls in the group are all that concerned about Pan, but I know better. Upon further research I understand how potentially dangerous this is and I want to help you find my best friend." Bra crossed her arms over her chest with satisfaction.

"I think you've done quite enough." Gohan snapped. He ran a hand through his hair, cursing under his breath.

"Well, too bad," Bra leaned forward, "because I've already got my people working on it and we're going to find her and bring her back."

Gohan shook his head, "I'm going to find Pan and bring her back to Shady Greens with me." He looked convinced enough, and at the wide-eyed look in Bra's eyes he took satisfaction. Whatever had happened to his daughter in the city obviously was a toxic sort of sickness of the mind. He wouldn't allow it.

"You're taking a city girl to the suburbs?" Bra practically shrieked, moving to her feet. "While you're at it, why don't you just shoot her?"

Sharply Gohan countered, "Better I take her home with me than leave her to wolves in the city like you that are going to get her kidnapped, raped and murdered. Pan has _goals _in life."

"I am Pan's life now_." _Bra was breathing slowly, almost hunched over and crumbled up in her self-love.

* * *

Insincerity comes to mind. Her every movement, her every word seemed to only serve to create a scene. Gohan shook his head in disapproval.

"I need to explain something to you, the rules of the game." She said, looking over at him, or sort of looking through him, looking past him. She was walking briskly and sometimes when they passed workers they would feed her ego by stopping to shake like little mice and watch her.

"I'm surprised that you've operated with any rules, Miss Briefs." He said stiffly. He'd been in this place before, or one like it. Capsule Corporations seemed infinite and eternal and he wondered how it could produce a creature such as Bura.

Bra chose to ignore him and continue, "You obviously can't fall in love with your target or we'll, you know, make fun of you. So there are some simple rules that help to prevent this." She said it all as if it were nothing with a wave of her pale, dainty hand. Gohan glared at her hand like it was made of something damned, like the little rings on her fingers and the bangles on her wrist were scars and scabs and boils, all grotesque and black.

He could only resent the remark and wish he'd never said anything at all.

"First you have to tell the man three progressively bigger lies about yourself. This rule exists so that in the event that he tries to tell you he loves you, you can just tell him he doesn't know you at all. It's all a part of our guilt-free package." Bra was comically pedantic, still waving her hand about.

Gohan just shook his head. "You're awful." He rubbed his forehead, and when he closed his eyes he saw his daughter, happy and young and uncorrupted. When he opened them, he saw Bra Briefs, painted and pretentious and decorated like a goddess or a Christmas tree.

"You know, if you keep saying things like that you're going to hurt my feelings."

"I don't _care _about you or your stupid feelings, not that it appears that you have any. I just want to know where Pan is." He said it more harshly than he'd intended to, but he was losing patience and ready to be rid of the girl altogether. From the self-satisfied smile to the way she seemed to praise his daughter's corruption, Gohan bit his lip to hold back darker words for the despicable girl. He'd heard enough of her nonsense and taunts and jokes.

"So why haven't you tried to sense her out?" Bra asks with wide blue curious eyes.

Gohan flushed, "What do you mean?"

"You're a Saiya-Jin, aren't you? You're friends of my dad's. My dad can sense people, so why can't you sense Pan?"

Gohan closed his eyes to remember _Bra's dad. _His name was Vegeta, an arrogant warrior with harsh words and an almost iron fist. Gohan spent the first half of his childhood fearing Vegeta, loathing Vegeta, and distrusting him. The following portion he spent admiring and respecting him.

"That's the most alarming thing. I can't." Gohan dropped his head a little bit at the idea of his failure, surprised at his own honesty, "Which means it's either being suppressed somehow or she's really weak or she's really far away."

"None of those are good things." Bra said, shaking her head. "Well, my brother's a genius, so when you meet him try to be a little more polite to him than you were to me."

Her heels clicking down the hallway, Gohan felt his body tighten at the thought of seeing Trunks Briefs again. He hadn't seen him since he was a kid, and Gohan wondered what the adult would look like. As the door opened, the first thing he noticed was the lab reeked of smoke. He coughed a little bit, which in a freak chain of events caused Bra Briefs to let out little bubbles of giggles into the air, which caused him to glare at her as he coughed even harder as she laughed even more.

"Bra!" the young man called her name as he strode up to them. "And… Son Gohan? Is that you?" He squinted over at Gohan, as if trying to peer behind the years and see the exuberant young warrior he knew long ago.

Gohan flushed a bit, "Trunks. How are you? Where's your mother?"

"Chain smoking," he responded with a look of exasperation. "So you're here about Pan?"

"Bra's spoken to you?" Gohan asked, letting out a sigh of relief that he was now clearly dealing with an adult.

"Speaking of," Trunks turned to look at his sister, "Go take care of that errand, will you? I'm going to try to figure this out with Gohan so we can get a lead on where Juunana is."

"No way," Bra crossed her arms over her chest, "I'm not going to just be excluded like this, you guys."

"Bra, this isn't a game." Trunks said, shaking his head, "Pan could really be in some trouble right now and I think that the best way for you to help right now is to do what I've asked. " He bent down just slightly to look her in the eyes, and with a smile he produced a box of colored cigarettes from his lab coat. Sticking a pink one in between her slightly upturned lips, he lit it up for her with a smile and a bid, "Be a good girl."

Gohan watched with his jaw open as Bra Briefs nearly skipped away, trail of smoke behind her. There was something ghoulish about her, this girl floating about the halls of Capsule Corporation.

"She's not so bad if you know how to handle her." Trunks said with a smile. "It is nice to see you again, Gohan. I wish the circumstances were better. Since Bra is rather uh, flighty, can you tell me what exactly is going on?"

Gohan ran a hand through his hair, "Pan recently moved to the city, but she missed dinner with us after not speaking to us all week. I make a trip out to the city just to check in and I find Pan's door half open, her apartment in disarray and your sister looking frantically through Pan's things. She tells me that Pan's vanished, and in case we hadn't guessed it's her fault."

Trunks nods. "So we know that Pan's been running around with Juunana recently, and when he found out that she was the granddaughter of the great Son Gokou…"

"Oh, god!" Gohan exclaimed, putting a hand to his mouth. "And you haven't been able to locate Juunana yet?"

"What about your people?" Trunks asked, putting a hand on his chin. "How many people are out looking for Pan right now?"

Gohan ran a hand through his hair again. "I've sent a team but it just feels like I should take care of this one by myself." He shook his head, "It's really hot in here." He took his jacket off, revealing for the first time the gun holster wrapped around his upper body.

"Come on, Detective," Trunks returned snidely, "what's the real reason you haven't gotten your people on it?"

"The same reason I'm carrying this gun in the first place: I need to protect people. You and I both know that my daughter can take care of herself against most other people, and I can't have innocent people getting involved with this. They're good cops, but they'll just get in the way. This needs to stay within us. I'm trying to locate Juunana, yes, but I know that Capsule Corporations can probably do it faster."

Trunks smiled, "Yes, and it's usually for a price."

"So you're all terrible." Gohan shook his head, pulling his wallet out of his jacket. "Well then, if it's money you want-"

"That's not what I said." Trunks shook his head. "Look, you're right. I can help you out but it's going to take a little time. Juunana's not an ordinary person. I've already begun. That's actually where I sent Bra."

"I'm not following."

"In order to locate Juunana I need some of Mom's work in her old lab. I sent Bra to go get that, along with a piece of machinery that's hopefully going to help us pinpoint Juunana."

"But he doesn't have a ki." Gohan said, shaking his head.

"We're not looking for his ki, but it is another type of signature that we're going to try to locate."

"How long is this going to take, for you to make this?"

Trunks laughed a little bit, "Well, we'll just say that it will take much less time if you trust me and stop asking questions. Until this is ready, Bra's been keeping pretty close tabs on Juunana and she knows where Pan was supposed to be with him last."

"You seem surprisingly calm, Trunks."

The younger man shrugged, putting on his glasses, "Weird family."

* * *

"So you're a detective, that's what you do for a living?" She said, frowning like she didn't believe it.

He'd gotten this reaction before. Gohan sighed, shaking his head, "I uphold peace and justice, is that so hard to believe?"

"It just sounds so cool and romantic in my head." Bra says, shaking her head. "And then I look at uh… you." He resented the smile placed on her lips. Really, the snide comments about how he was too plain, simple, old and boring for her were beginning to wear thin on his nerves.

"If you're quite done insulting me," He hissed, "We have things to be doing here." Gohan rubbed his eyes with his hands, "Anyway, where are we going?"

"Don't be bitter that you're ancient and dull!"

Red faced, Gohan shook his head, as if trying to banish her voice from his head, "Would you stop it with that and just tell me where this place is supposed to be?"

"Well, Pan was supposed to take Juunana to this hotel. This was where they were going to sleep together for the first time."

Gohan flinched.

"I'm sorry, I never know if I'm being too vague." She said with narrowed eyes. Her eyes fluttered over his form before setting on the gun shining innocently in the moonlight. She considered the weapon for a moment, but before Gohan could in sarcastic tone ask her what she wanted now, she pointed to it, asking, "So why do you even carry a gun? If you're even half as strong as my dad is, there's no way you could even need one."

"Do you really think that if I started using my Saiya-Jin powers anything good would happen?" Gohan snapped, "And I've been stronger than your dad since I was younger than you, Princess, so watch your mouth."

Bra's eyes widened, "I'll have you know my father is the greatest warrior in the universe! He said so." In defiance, Bra crossed her arms over her chest. She huffed a little bit, shaking her head.

Gohan glared at her, "Which room was it?"

Bra smiled, "It was 2112. Come on, Gohan." She smiled at him. They took the stairs to the second level. When she opened the room, there was nothing but music still looping about, entertaining itself. "Oh look!" Bra chirped, "They had drinks."

"How very wonderful," Gohan remarked sarcastically, rolling his eyes. "Bra, how did you have the key to get into the room?"

She flashed him a brilliant smile, pushing her bangs from her eyes, "I have my ways."

In an instant, his heart went violent and he could no longer contain himself. Before he could control himself, Gohan found his hands grasped around Bra's wrists, roughly forcing her against a wall. Practically shaking in his rage, he felt his throat full of fire as he growled, "Now listen here, you conceited, coy little brat! I'm here to find my daughter and you're _not _helping me."

"Is this the good cop or the bad cop?" She asked, batting her eyes up at him. With a groan of frustration he released her, finding his fingers immediately moving to run themselves over his forehead. He had to think, and that was something he found Bura was very good at: inhibiting normal thought process. Sourly he mused that the girl ought to come with a warning about her neck that she may induce madness.

"I don't understand how girls like you do the things you do. Why does your whole life revolve around being a menace?"

"Menace is pretty harsh, don't you think?" She asked, moving over to the bar again. She examined the bottle for a moment before pouring herself a glass. When he didn't respond she laughed it off, taking a sip of the wine, lifting her glass towards him as if she were saluting him or congratulating him on something rather unimportant. "I mean, why not?"

Not that he thought that it would matter, but Gohan looked over at her seriously and asked, "Well, wouldn't you like to have a meaningful relationship with a nice boy? Do you find your lifestyle to be rewarding, Bura?"

"Gohan, seriously, let me just gag and die right now." Bra scoffed, "I can't believe you'd say something like that, you really are someone's dad."

"Are you just going to sit around and drink or are you going to look around with me?" He said, turning his attention back to the room: it was assuredly Bura's choice: modern and pretentious. He bent his head down and on the floor there it was, innocent enough, a black sweater that undoubtedly belonged to his daughter. He bent down very slowly, as if looking at something he wanted desperately to believe was a lie. As he lifted t from the ground, something fell innocently to the ground.

Condoms.

Gohan's fingers were trembling. He focused all of his energy on the way that her sweater felt, soft like it was cashmere or something expensive, light material. It still smelled faintly of perfume, and he didn't even know she used it. _Where has my daughter been, and what has this wretch done to her? _

Bra smiled and set the drink down. "And I can't, just to let you know."

"You can't what?" He asked absentmindedly. He was walking slowly about the place, trying to look for any other signs of use. Gohan was almost afraid of the bedroom door ominously cracked open and what he would find when his hand outstretched and pushed the door back and his eyes had to fall upon a bed, and worn sheets, and a man's shirt. Images of his daughter real and imagined ran through his head. He could see her with an ice cream cone as big as her head as a toddler, happy and content, waving her chubby arms around excitedly. He could see his daughter a little older, tears of frustration forming a small puddle on moist soil after losing a sparring match to her grandfather.

He could see her as a teenager, checking her reflection in glass windows at the mall when she thought no one else noticed. He saw her still, older, more developed and poised, smiling broadly as she held a letter of acceptance out before him.

Now his mind cast itself forward, and he could see his daughter in a tight black dress looking pouty and bored with too much makeup on as she made eyes at someone dangerous and dark and terrible for the sake of it.

Something cracked in his hand. Vaguely his mind registered that it was a button from his daughter's sweater.

"I can't have a meaningful relationship, and I can't have a family. I've known I was infertile since I was sixteen." Bra crossed her arms over her chest, looking uncomfortable for the first time. Gohan had to look up to watch her.

"I'm sorry." He said. The room was still. The city lights twinkled in the background, let in from the innocent curtains.

"It doesn't matter. Anyway, you know the more you insult me, the more you insult Pan. She wants to be just like me, you know."

He visibly flinched at the idea. "Well, maybe this experience will guide her away from such a foolish idea."

"How do you know it won't just make her more addicted to the thrill of the hunt?" Bra asked. "How do you know Pan's not under the radar by choice because she's still getting the job done?"

"There would have been no reason for you to have called me down here at all, now would there?" He retorted shortly. When he looked up, he could still see something like shame or discomfort written all over his face, and a little more gently he added, "You know, Bra, one day you're going to regret thinking of people as commodities."

"I'll let you know when the day comes, Gohan. Until then, if you would, let's be a little less condescending, yeah?"

Suddenly, Bra's cell phone began chirping. "It's my brother." She scooped the phone from her bag. "He wants us to come back."

* * *

"Bra, don't play with that." Trunks said without looking up. "So anyway, we've found the exact location of Juunana's cabin in the country. You may recognize the area."

Trunks handed the paper to Gohan and as he looked down at the location he frowned. "It is really just by where my dad lives."

"This is the most frightening thing, honestly." Trunks said. In a lower voice, he said, "Look, I didn't really know your daughter, but Bra's a good girl." He looked in her direction as he said it, watching her as she made fun with the random contraptions scattered about his lab. "I really don't think they knew that this guy used to have a thing against Gokou and Pan could have potentially opened some old wounds."

"If you're asking me to forgive Bra, I hope you understand how impossible it would be for me to do that."

With a sigh, Trunks looked up, "So you know the area well?"

"Like the back of my hand." Gohan said.

"Good. While I'm finishing up the locator, you can go check this area out. With any luck, they'll be hiding out there and you can end this." Trunks gave the older man a half-smile and Gohan silently appreciated that finally he was speaking with someone genuine.

Gohan looked up, but was interrupted by a terrible clicking sound. He tilted his head to the side. It was more the look of horror on the older brother's face that struck panic into his chest.

With a slightly frightened look in her eyes, Bra held up the broken device and said, "I did something, and I did something _bad._"

* * *

**Next time: Trunks sends Bra and Gohan to Juunana's house in the country. Little does he know, their car has been tampered with and the two are stranded in the forest. **


End file.
